Harold Mabern Trio - Somewhere Over The Rainbow '2007 [2018]

Tracks list

Harold Mabern was born in Memphis, Tennessee in 1936 and spent some of his early
years in Chicago before moving to New York in the early 1960s. There he began to
work with Lionel Hampton, Art Farmers Jazztet and J.J. Johnson. Mabern has
accompanied many vocalists including Joe Williams, Sarah Vaughan, Dakota Staton,
Irene Reid and Arthur Prysock. Hes also worked with Roland Kirk, Sonny Rollins,
Freddie Hubbard, Lee Morgan, Roy Haynes, Wes Montgomery, Clark Terry, Billy
Harper, Joe Newman and George Coleman. 

In an interview with All About Jazz, Mabern discussed his tribute to Harold
Arlen saying, Ive always studied him because his music is very bluesy. And you
dont really have to do anything to his music but just go ahead and play it. I
dont think he sat down and said, Im gonna be bluesy, its just that the music
came out that way.

Harold Mabern is one of a number of American jazz artists who have developed a
strong following in Japan, resulting in regular opportunities to record for the
Japanese Venus label. This trio date with bassist Dwayne Burno and drummer
Willie Jones III (the latter sticking mainly to brushes) covers ten songs from
the vast Harold Arlen songbook, though not all of them are well-known standards.
Maberns bouncing, breezy opener is a fun-filled take of Over the Rainbow,
followed by a gospel-inflected soul-jazz treatment of A Sleepin Bee that
prominently features Burno. His blues-drenched take of Blues in the Night is
harmonically rich, while Maberns jovial treatment of Ive Got the World on a
String swings like mad. The pianist adds a hip Latin vamp to introduce a
soul-jazz-infused arrangement of This Time the Dreams on Me. Savannah is not one
of Arlens better-known tunes, but Maberns chart sets it up as a calypso before
seguing into hard bop, with Jones getting several breaks on sticks. —
AllMusic

Tracks:

01. Somewhere Over The Rainbow
02. A Sleeping Bee
03. Blues In The Night
04. Out Of This World
05. Savanna
06. Hooray For Love
07. Stormy Weather
08. Ive Got The World On A String
09. The Man That Got Away 
10. This Time The Dreams On Me

all songs by Harold Arlen 

Personnel:

Harold Mabern - piano
Dwayne Burno - bass
Willie Jones â…¢ - drums

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